April 30, 2009

This week I'm starting off the Baking & Pastry project with the recipe for Pain de Mie (page 134) from the Culinary Institute of America's Baking & Pastry book. This dough can be used to make oblong loaves (pg 184 & 222) or into cylinder loaves using a pain de mie pan.

Until starting the Baking & Pastry project, I hadn't used metric quantities very often. Most of those recipes were for the monthly baking challenges for the international baking online group, The Daring Bakers. After baking some of these recipes, I realized how easy it was to use my kitchen scale and the metric beakers that are in my kitchen. It also helps, that my son's Geometry work is always done in both imperial and metric measurements, so I get in a fair bit of practice.

If you are interested in adding the ability to use metric quantities in your baking, one of the best investments I made for baking is a kitchen scale. You want one that has ounces, pounds, kilograms and grams, like the one from Escali.

Next you'll need to get a measuring cup or beaker that measures in milliliters, like the Emsa beaker which measures six different ways. A mini measuring cup that does smaller amounts is helpful, such as the one from Oxo, but isn't necessary is you have metric equivalents on your measuring spoons. Take a look at measuring spoons like the ones from Roscan, or another option is a progressive international measuring set that starts at 1/32 tsp and goes through 2 cups, made by Progressive.

If you aren't ready to add a scale or metric cups and spoons to your kitchen, one of the best baking or cooking resources is the Gourmet Sleuth website. They have a variety of measurement converters to help you change anything from drops all the way through gills.

This recipe is made with a bread flour that in the original version has 31.59 grams of protein per 100 grams of flour. The gluten free version has 31.51 grams of protein for 100 grams of flour. The protein contents of each flour used follow in the parenthesis.

This loaf turned out to be rich tasting loaf that was reminiscent of a whole grain bread. I served it with a breakfast meal of fruit salad and egg and ham cups. My family thoroughly enjoyed this loaf of bread.

1. In a large bowl combine all the dry ingredients and blend. Add the wet ingredients and stir into a cohesive dough.

2. On a sheet of parchment paper sprinkle some sweet rice flour and then set the ball of dough on it. Shape into an oblong loaf and place in a warm location to rise for 1 1/2 hours.

3. Place the baking stone into the oven and preheat the oven to 375 degrees F/190 degrees C. Brush the egg wash over the loaf and once the oven is preheated, slide the parchment paper with the loaf on it into the oven. Bake for 35 to 45 minutes and the crust is a golden brown.

6 comments:

You've been baking up a storm! I've been wanting ask one of you gluten free folks, does the chia meal do the same job as a binder as flax seed meal does? (I'm wondering if I could use it as another kind of egg subsitute.) Thanks, Libby

Great looking bread! Amazing how you have been able to replicate protein levels. Have any of your bread doughs displayed some of the characteristically "gluten" traits, eg, dough that can stretch to paperthin consistency, a baked texture that is able to stretch without breaking, etc? Just curious. Keep up the awesome work!